(L) Risou no Himo Seikatsu

[PROzess]

Originally Posted by J4n1

That's not containment, that's damage control.
If Zenjirou has two bloodlines then containment is no more.
Because the whole idea of containment is to keep it in one family/kingdom.

And considering the remarks from Aura about, other nations would attempt to get their hands on the bloodline magic of other nations.
The idea that it never, ever, works, when you have potentially thousands of people trying it for potentially thousands of years is ludicrous.

If it was just 1 person per generation, then it might be doable, but not the way it is depicted in the novels.
And the argument here is that it does not work (in story), it's that the storyteller has failed to provide any workable mechanic for it to work.

It's like having a story about a world with 0% crime rate.
Technicly possible (it does not violate any known laws of physics), but if you depict that world inhabited by humans like us, it is not believable.

But they aren't like us, that's the point.

[J4n1]

Originally Posted by PROzess

But they aren't like us, that's the point.

They are depicted as being exactly like us, apart from existence of magic.
Human nature remains the same both here, and there.
So unless the author decides to bring up a magical solution for the issues people here have brought up, the situation remains unrealistic.

Lust, greed, and the basic human capacity for mistakes, remain an issue.

[PROzess]

Originally Posted by J4n1

They are depicted as being exactly like us, apart from existence of magic.
Human nature remains the same both here, and there.
So unless the author decides to bring up a magical solution for the issues people here have brought up, the situation remains unrealistic.

Lust, greed, and the basic human capacity for mistakes, remain an issue.

The only ever decipted instance of two bloodline mixing were Zenjirou's ancestors. The only one ever.
And even that single case was treated more like a fairytale with no records left behind. The ony quasi proof for it ever happening is Zenjirou's existence.
Now why would it be treated like that? If people eloped with royalty from a foreign country, people would talk about it, but they don't. There's only a single rumour floating around, which isn't even well-known either.
So it's hardly unlikely that these "human mistakes" happen all the time.
Zenjirou's ancestors are an isolated case, which happened out of love, not out of the desire to mix two bloodlines.

[Waxman]

Just to be sure, you can accept/enjoy magic, travel to other world with said magic, the fact that the new world is almost equal to the earth to the point that Zenjiro doesn't have problems breathing the air, that the only time he was ill in this new world was due to a "japanese cold", among other things.
.
But you have problem with the idea that royal males can keep it in their pants? Or that the people in charge can ensure that they have intercourse with aproved people.
.
Weird place to draw the line.

[Urbano]

Originally Posted by Waxman

Weird place to draw the line.

You forgot MAGIC, be okay with MAGIC, but not eveything else?!
but to be fair, sex is always are a significant line to most ppl.

[J4n1]

Originally Posted by PROzess

The only ever decipted instance of two bloodline mixing were Zenjirou's ancestors. The only one ever.
And even that single case was treated more like a fairytale with no records left behind. The ony quasi proof for it ever happening is Zenjirou's existence.
Now why would it be treated like that? If people eloped with royalty from a foreign country, people would talk about it, but they don't. There's only a single rumour floating around, which isn't even well-known either.
So it's hardly unlikely that these "human mistakes" happen all the time.
Zenjirou's ancestors are an isolated case, which happened out of love, not out of the desire to mix two bloodlines.

Yes, one case, and my point is that, without some further explanation on this, it is unrealistic that it only happened once.

Originally Posted by Waxman

Just to be sure, you can accept/enjoy magic, travel to other world with said magic, the fact that the new world is almost equal to the earth to the point that Zenjiro doesn't have problems breathing the air, that the only time he was ill in this new world was due to a "japanese cold", among other things.
.
But you have problem with the idea that royal males can keep it in their pants? Or that the people in charge can ensure that they have intercourse with aproved people.
.
Weird place to draw the line.

The fact that the world, and its people, are so similar to earth, makes the fact that this one instance is so much unlike anything i would ever expect from humans on earth, makes it so unrealistic.

We're talking about thousands of people, over dozens of generations.
Eventually, someone will make a mistake that does not get caught on time.

Now, we can theorize on how these situations might be dealt with, but the story itself has not given any workable mechanics for it to happen, and has clearly stated that it is an ongoing concern.

This is the "No Endor holocaust" of this story.
A point where, against all logic, reason or known facts, we just have to take the authors word for it (assuming there is authors word for it, or if we're dealing with unreliable narrator).

Originally Posted by Urbano

You forgot MAGIC, be okay with MAGIC, but not eveything else?!
but to be fair, sex is always are a significant line to most ppl.

Every story is, to a degree, rooted in reality except when and where stated otherwise.
Gravity works, time moves forward, humans are humans.
Because story has not shown people to be anything but people, we should expect them to behave like people.

And assuming no prince or lord ever fucks (and gets pregnant) a random peasant woman while out in the country, at a war front, or just visiting a neighboring nation, is unreasonable.

Now, maybe the author has come up with a system that stops that from happening, but so far, it has not been shown.

[al103]

Originally Posted by J4n1

humans are humans.

Meaning lazy and easily scared.

There is exactly zero point for them to seek sex outside of "comfort zone" because they have plenty of it in it and not being able to keep your sex drive to wives and concubines is very fast road to execution or imprisonment.

About the only thing that can motivate people enough is strong feeling so either hate or love. First is much easier detected, second require mutual agreement.

[Breimn]

What i wonder the most, in these thousands of years were there other royal families who completly lost wars and got their land taken?
What happened to them? Did they not get captured and used for arranged marriages?
Were they completly killed off? Or could they not have taken asylum in some other country in exchange for their bloodline magic?

[PROzess]

Originally Posted by J4n1

Every story is, to a degree, rooted in reality except when and where stated otherwise.
Gravity works, time moves forward, humans are humans.
Because story has not shown people to be anything but people, we should expect them to behave like people.

And assuming no prince or lord ever fucks (and gets pregnant) a random peasant woman while out in the country, at a war front, or just visiting a neighboring nation, is unreasonable.

Now, maybe the author has come up with a system that stops that from happening, but so far, it has not been shown.

The "humans" in the different world were raised in a completely different environment than the humans on Earth.
Magic is a dominated factor in the world, the bloodline magic even more so. It must be protected at all cost. And people were raised for years, centuries, with that in mind. It's not weird to assume the concept of "containing the bloodline magic" is rooted in every people like we have the concept of "freedom for everyone". It's just fundamentally different.

Originally Posted by J4n1

Yes, one case, and my point is that, without some further explanation on this, it is unrealistic that it only happened once.

But why do you insist that there are more cases? That's more unreleastict. You want these cases to happen, just because. No real argument. The author clearly has introduced a paranoic sense of keeping the bloodline to itself. Furthermore the only ever case mentioned (and why would you assume there are more when the author himself writes that there is only one) is treated so goddamned vaguely that it isnt even clear if it actually happened.
Like I said in my previous post: If, like you claim, these mixtures happen all the time, then people would know about! People would disappear (either volunatarily or forced) because they broke the absolute taboo in the world. It would be unrealistic if these cases could be all kept a secret. But they aren't speaking about that, nor know about such cases. There is only a SINGLE rumour. Nothing more. We can conclude that this case is not a common occurence and that the containment policy of the royalty actually works.

[laclongquan]

Originally Posted by Breimn

What i wonder the most, in these thousands of years were there other royal families who completly lost wars and got their land taken?
What happened to them? Did they not get captured and used for arranged marriages?
Were they completly killed off? Or could they not have taken asylum in some other country in exchange for their bloodline magic?

What you asked didnt get mentioned in translated chapters. But.

There is this magical method called concubinage. And a jail called harem. For victors, the bodies of captured royals should be an important part of the loot, since they can hope to breed back the magic into their own lines.

On earth, the possibility of future revolts using defeated royalty as figurehead do happen even if said figurehead is only so-called self proclaimed royalty descendant (since the old ones should get offed already). On this magic world, all of them get captured. Anyone want to call themselves ex-royalty must display magic.

[Breimn]

You didn't get the point of my question. Didnt any of the loser side get raped by the winner side?
Each royal bloodline only has one magic so that would mean that all the royals whose country was completly defeated would have all died or end up like the only country mentioned where there seems more than 1 royal bloodline ruling at the same time.
Wars as mentioned do happen in this world too afterall.

[PhilippeO]

It also possible that "magical traits" is extremely recessive.

most concubine candidate also boasted some royal ancestry in their genealogy, but none of them show royal magic. And this from powerful noble family who presumably frequently have long and continuous marriage relation with royal house.

There might be need for constant reinforcement of doubling back / re-marriage to make 'royal magic' gene reappear. it might be that for royal magic to occur they need infrastructure : good genealogy, constant marriage between branch of royal house, limiting amount of outsider new blood to endogamous royalty, etc. Just like real world handling of throughbreed horse or fancy dogbreed.

some royal gene who scattered to common people might simply disappear. people who have 1/8, 1/16 or less royal heritage (great grandma is maid at palace) might never show any magical abilities anymore.

With constant watching and genealogy for people who are known to have royal trait. Adoption of people outside royalty (nobility) who show magical trait. And disappearance of trait in commoner. With these things appearance of 'royal magic' in commoners might be close to nil.

destroyed royal house, without infrastructure to support constant re-marriage might simply have their gene disappear and become ordinary commoners.

Even if some royal blood 'leak' to other royal family they might disappear without constant remarriage/reinforcement. Sharon and Gibbell family appear to limit intermarriage, and these between two house in same country, This could possibly tactic to preserve 'royal magic'. Occurrence of two different 'royal magic' in same family might lead to one of them 'disappear' without constant attention to genealogy.

[J4n1]

Originally Posted by PhilippeO

It also possible that "magical traits" is extremely recessive.

most concubine candidate also boasted some royal ancestry in their genealogy, but none of them show royal magic. And this from powerful noble family who presumably frequently have long and continuous marriage relation with royal house.

There might be need for constant reinforcement of doubling back / re-marriage to make 'royal magic' gene reappear. it might be that for royal magic to occur they need infrastructure : good genealogy, constant marriage between branch of royal house, limiting amount of outsider new blood to endogamous royalty, etc. Just like real world handling of throughbreed horse or fancy dogbreed.

some royal gene who scattered to common people might simply disappear. people who have 1/8, 1/16 or less royal heritage (great grandma is maid at palace) might never show any magical abilities anymore.

With constant watching and genealogy for people who are known to have royal trait. Adoption of people outside royalty (nobility) who show magical trait. And disappearance of trait in commoner. With these things appearance of 'royal magic' in commoners might be close to nil.

destroyed royal house, without infrastructure to support constant re-marriage might simply have their gene disappear and become ordinary commoners.

Even if some royal blood 'leak' to other royal family they might disappear without constant remarriage/reinforcement. Sharon and Gibbell family appear to limit intermarriage, and these between two house in same country, This could possibly tactic to preserve 'royal magic'. Occurrence of two different 'royal magic' in same family might lead to one of them 'disappear' without constant attention to genealogy.

And here's an actual, workable, mechanic to keep the magic somewhat rare.
Though it brings up how Zenjirou has such a strong magic going on.
How many generations was it since his family went to Japan?

Also, where do the magical bloodlins come from?
Random mutation? Intentional breeding? Alien experimentation? Gods?

[PROzess]

Originally Posted by J4n1

Also, where do the magical bloodlins come from?
Random mutation? Intentional breeding? Alien experimentation? Gods?

It's magic, it ain't gonna explain shit.

Tbh, I prefer it when magic is just explained as a given, instead of trying to justify it with the existence of some fairy or god.
Most people's idea of magic is biased these anyway, too many transported/fantasy novels with magic everywhere.

[laclongquan]

I dont think recessive is enough to explain about the lack of understanding where bloodlines come from. It would show over the millenia, especially when we are talking about a very valuable gene/bloodlines here.

Recessive but resonate with some other factor, environmental magic maybe? or time? Or when stars aligned~

[ungururuh]

The magic and bloodline magic of the world is partially and indirectly explained where it comes from.

"We can classify magic into two groups. The first group is the ’Four- Element Magic’ that can be
more or less used by everyone. The other group is the ’Bloodline Magic’ that only people with a
unique lineage can use.”

"O invisible water scattered in the air, gather at my finger and form a sphere. As compensation,
I will make eighteen offerings of magical power to the water spirit."

From the two paragraphs we can easily deduce that spirits are the ones that bestow the magic to the people and only the spirits can create magic. The people only make an offering under the form of "magical power" to them and they are the ones that create the phenomenon known as magic. This conjecture is further validated when it is explained that people can offer "units of magical power" from the future in order to create a larger magical phenomenon at the present time. In other words they make a loan to the spirits in the form of "magical power units" in order for them to have the benefit now and pay their debt in time (like making a loan to the bank and buying a car/apartment now and pay the loan later). And until that "magical power unit" loan is payed off they won't be able to invoke magic.

Also bloodline magic is...

"Cut off a spherical space of the world around the tip of my finger. As compensation, I will make
three-hundred and fifty-nine offerings of magical power to the Space-Time spirit."

In other words it's a specific kind of offering that is made to a specific type of spirit, in the case of the Carpa bloodline it's the Space-Time spirit and from this we could further deduce that in order for a "bloodline" type of magic to work the specific spirit has to recognize the offering and the only way that they say they will recognize that offering is by the one that is making the offering to have a certain blood from a particular lineage and from the obsession of the royal families to keep the purity of the blood at a certain level we can also deduce that a bloodline magic can also be lost if the "bloodline" is diluted to a certain extend.

Originally Posted by TL;TR

So the marker recognized by the spirits is not in the genes but in the blood, hence why the "bloodline" term is used. In other words, bloodline magic came into being not by random mutation, intentional breeding or alien experimentation, but from a origin point and most likely it was along the lines of either somewhere in the past one of their ancestors impressed the Space-Time spirit and was blessed by it or the Space-Time spirit came into human form and procreated?

Warning here be spoilers

Spoiler for Zenjirou magic power situation:

Now the first clue as to why Zenjirou still has the amount of magical power and the blood purity needed to activate the bloodline magic that he has is from the first volume where...

"Ah, yes. Actually, I come from an isolated rural village with a long history. From way back,
only one or two people per generation married someone from outside the village.”

"Come to think of it, most people of the village, starting with his parents, who died in a traffic accident when he was in middle school, had rather dark skin and reddish hair for a Japanese."

"Indeed. So as a result, that isolated village prevented the royal blood from thinning down in the other world."


The second clue is from a few of Zenjirou comments about his son where he states that he can feel magical power on par or even higher then Aura.

The third clue is from a random thought from Zenjirou where he wonders why he has a sense of familiarity coming from Prince Francesco.

Originally Posted by TL;TR

(by now I think you know where this is going...)
And the final clue and the reveal is when prince Francesco is treating Zenkichi and ...*tutututum (trumpet sound) it's revealed that both Zenkichi (aka Zenjirou son) and prince Francesco have mixed bloodline and the real reason prince Francesco is sent personally is that he is the only one from the double kingdom that can easily confirm without a doubt if Zenkichi has mixed blood as well because people with mixed bloodline can sense each other.

And...you guessed it... the familiarity that Zenjirou was feeling from prince Francesco was because Zenjirou has mixed blood as well.

Now, normally, magical power(this can be breed) that the next generation inherits will only be, in some cases, a bit higher ("genius" type people are excluded, remember the first magic teacher that Zenjirou would have had if not for the young wife?) but not by much. The exception to this rule are people that come from a mixed of bloodlines that inherited "bloodline magic". In their cases it is said that their magical power is double that of their parents (in the case of Zenkichi it is also hinted that he might even be a genius on top of the double inheritance).

So the reason as to why Zenjirou still has so much magical power (even after 5-6 generations I think? something like that) is because of the mixed bloodline that came with a double magic amount and because of the efforts of his family from Earth to keep the bloodline yet again as pure as possible. One of the stated reasons as to why Zenjirou didn't want to inherit the home of his parents is because he wanted to be more modern and have a family outside of the island and live in the city which is funny when you think who he eventually ended up marrying. (but what can you say, love *cough cleav.. ( .Y. ) *cough prevails every time)

extra^1 Francesco isn't allowed to have children and also denied the king throne because of his mixed blood ... bastards!! and poor poor Francesco
extra^2 Francesco hints that he is on Zenkichi, Zenjirou and Aura side (my conjecture is that he wants Zenkichi to successfully inherit the throne and by this create a precedent that he could use, most likely to marry someone he loves because he does appear melancholic when he talks about Zenkichi situation)
extra^3 People that are considered "royal" in each faction (and by this I mean people that can use the bloodline magic and from which someone can inherit the bloodline magic) are not many, I think Aura states somewhere that depending on the faction they are between 15 or 30 or around there(and I'm not sure that you can inherit the bloodline magic from all of them). In other words you can't inherit the bloodline magic just from anyone that has the Carpa bloodline and by that I mean from the people that are considered "nobles" (nobles being people that have the bloodline but not enough of it in order to use the bloodline magic, that is why Carpa is stated to be in such dire situation; there are a lot of people that still have the Carpa blood in that state but only Aura's child will be able to use the bloodline magic. The reason that Zenjirou is a "pleasant surprise" is because his children can also inherit the Carpa bloodline magic and that is why he becomes so crucial to the revival of the Carpa Kingdom)

[PROzess]

Originally Posted by ungururuh

Spoiler for space:

The magic and bloodline magic of the world is partially and indirectly explained where it comes from.

"We can classify magic into two groups. The first group is the ’Four- Element Magic’ that can be
more or less used by everyone. The other group is the ’Bloodline Magic’ that only people with a
unique lineage can use.”

"O invisible water scattered in the air, gather at my finger and form a sphere. As compensation,
I will make eighteen offerings of magical power to the water spirit."

From the two paragraphs we can easily deduce that spirits are the ones that bestow the magic to the people and only the spirits can create magic. The people only make an offering under the form of "magical power" to them and they are the ones that create the phenomenon known as magic. This conjecture is further validated when it is explained that people can offer "units of magical power" from the future in order to create a larger magical phenomenon at the present time. In other words they make a loan to the spirits in the form of "magical power units" in order for them to have the benefit now and pay their debt in time (like making a loan to the bank and buying a car/apartment now and pay the loan later). And until that "magical power unit" loan is payed off they won't be able to invoke magic.

Also bloodline magic is...

"Cut off a spherical space of the world around the tip of my finger. As compensation, I will make
three-hundred and fifty-nine offerings of magical power to the Space-Time spirit."

In other words it's a specific kind of offering that is made to a specific type of spirit, in the case of the Carpa bloodline it's the Space-Time spirit and from this we could further deduce that in order for a "bloodline" type of magic to work the specific spirit has to recognize the offering and the only way that they say they will recognize that offering is by the one that is making the offering to have a certain blood from a particular lineage and from the obsession of the royal families to keep the purity of the blood at a certain level we can also deduce that a bloodline magic can also be lost if the "bloodline" is diluted to a certain extend.



Warning here be spoilers

Spoiler for Zenjirou magic power situation:

Now the first clue as to why Zenjirou still has the amount of magical power and the blood purity needed to activate the bloodline magic that he has is from the first volume where...

"Ah, yes. Actually, I come from an isolated rural village with a long history. From way back,
only one or two people per generation married someone from outside the village.”

"Come to think of it, most people of the village, starting with his parents, who died in a traffic accident when he was in middle school, had rather dark skin and reddish hair for a Japanese."

"Indeed. So as a result, that isolated village prevented the royal blood from thinning down in the other world."


The second clue is from a few of Zenjirou comments about his son where he states that he can feel magical power on par or even higher then Aura.

The third clue is from a random thought from Zenjirou where he wonders why he has a sense of familiarity coming from Prince Francesco.



Now, normally, magical power(this can be breed) that the next generation inherits will only be, in some cases, a bit higher ("genius" type people are excluded, remember the first magic teacher that Zenjirou would have had if not for the young wife?) but not by much. The exception to this rule are people that come from a mixed of bloodlines that inherited "bloodline magic". In their cases it is said that their magical power is double that of their parents (in the case of Zenkichi it is also hinted that he might even be a genius on top of the double inheritance).

So the reason as to why Zenjirou still has so much magical power (even after 5-6 generations I think? something like that) is because of the mixed bloodline that came with a double magic amount and because of the efforts of his family from Earth to keep the bloodline yet again as pure as possible. One of the stated reasons as to why Zenjirou didn't want to inherit the home of his parents is because he wanted to be more modern and have a family outside of the island and live in the city which is funny when you think who he eventually ended up marrying. (but what can you say, love *cough cleav.. ( .Y. ) *cough prevails every time)

extra^1 Francesco isn't allowed to have children and also denied the king throne because of his mixed blood ... bastards!! and poor poor Francesco
extra^2 Francesco hints that he is on Zenkichi, Zenjirou and Aura side (my conjecture is that he wants Zenkichi to successfully inherit the throne and by this create a precedent that he could use, most likely to marry someone he loves because he does appear melancholic when he talks about Zenkichi situation)
extra^3 People that are considered "royal" in each faction (and by this I mean people that can use the bloodline magic and from which someone can inherit the bloodline magic) are not many, I think Aura states somewhere that depending on the faction they are between 15 or 30 or around there(and I'm not sure that you can inherit the bloodline magic from all of them). In other words you can't inherit the bloodline magic just from anyone that has the Carpa bloodline and by that I mean from the people that are considered "nobles" (nobles being people that have the bloodline but not enough of it in order to use the bloodline magic, that is why Carpa is stated to be in such dire situation; there are a lot of people that still have the Carpa blood in that state but only Aura child will be able to use the bloodline magic. The reason that Zenjirou is a "pleasant surprise" is because his children can also inherit the Carpa bloodline magic and that is why he becomes so crucial to the revival of the Carpa Kingdom)

Thanks for the in-depth explanation It really sum it up pretty well.
I'm pretty excited about the end of Volume 04 and I also dared to sneak a little peek at Vol 05, man, stupid thesis I want to translate more Risou...

[havensgate]

there's magic in that world, that should be enough explanations.
and what we read are fiction novel, not some autobiography or historic book so no need to use realistic rules over everything

Originally Posted by PROzess

Thanks for the in-depth explanation It really sum it up pretty well.
I'm pretty excited about the end of Volume 04 and I also dared to sneak a little peek at Vol 05, man, stupid thesis I want to translate more Risou...

then you should just do that PRO-san..hehehe...

[laclongquan]

Now that I think about it, there's another method to prevent runaways from magic bloodlines families/royalties: Assassins. It may sounds cruel but the magic bloodlines is equivalent to national advantage/defense, so it should be official policy to send assassins after runaways who stubbornly dont want to stay in a country.

An Earth historical equivalent is Venice sending assassins after runaway artisans with secrets of making glass in medieval times.

[Waxman]

Oh! An update, it may be only an intermission but its much apresiated!
.
Not only that, there are also images from Vol 6 and 7!
.
Really thanks to PROzess!